Next morning, only Claude and Campbell made their appearance at breakfast.
Frank came in; found that Valencia was not down: and, too excited to eat, went out to walk till she should appear. Neither did Lord Scoutbush come. Where was he?
Ignorant of the whole matter, he had started at four o'clock to fish in the Traeth Mawr; half for fishing's sake, half (as he confessed) to gain time for his puzzled brains before those explanations with Frank Headley, of which he stood in mortal fear.
Mellot and Campbell sat down together to breakfast; but in silence. Claude saw that something had gone very wrong; Campbell ate nothing, and looked nervously out of the window every now and then.
At last Bowie entered with the letters and a message. There were two gentlemen from Pen-y-gwryd must speak with Mr. Mellot immediately.
He went out and found Wynd and Naylor. What they told him we know already. He returned instantly, and met Campbell leaving the room.
"I have news of Vavasour," whispered he. "I have a letter from him.
Bowie, order me a car instantly for Bangor. I am off to London, Claude.
You and Bowie will take care of my things, and send them after me."
"Major Cawmill has only to command," said Bowie, and vanished down the stairs.
"Now, Claude, quick; read that and counsel me. I ought to ask
Scoutbush's opinion; but the poor dear fellow is out, you see."
Claude read the note written at Bangor.
"Fight him I will not! I detest the notion: a soldier should never fight a duel. His life is the Queen's, and not his own. And yet if the honour of the family has been compromised by my folly, I must pay the penalty, if Scoutbush thinks it proper."
So said Campbell, who, in the over-sensitiveness of his conscience, had actually worked himself round during the past night into this new fancy, as a chivalrous act of utter self-abasement. The proud self-possession of the man was gone, and nothing but self-distrust and shame remained.
"In the name of all wit and wisdom, what is the meaning of all this?"
"You do not know, then, what passed last night?"
"I? I can only guess that Vavasour has had one of his rages."
"Then you must know," said Campbell with an effort; "for you must explain all to Scoutbush when he returns; and I know no one more fit for the office." And he briefly told him the story.
Mellot was much affected. "The wretched ape! Campbell, your first thought was the true one: you must not fight that cur. After all, it's a farce: you won't fire at him, and he can't hit you—so leave ill alone. Beside, for Scoutbush's sake, her sake, every one's sake, the thing must be hushed up. If the fellow chooses to duck under into the London mire, let him lie there, and forget him!"
"No, Claude; his pardon I must beg, ere I go out to the war: or I shall die with a sin upon my soul."
"My dear, noble creature! if you must go, I go with you. I must see fair play between you and that madman; and give him a piece of my mind, too, while I am about it. He is in my power: or if not quite that, I know one in whose power he is! and to reason he shall be brought."
"No; you must stay here. I cannot trust Scoutbush's head, and these poor dear souls will have no one to look to but you. I can trust you with them, I know. Me you will perhaps never see again."
"You can trust me!" said the affectionate little painter, the tears starting to his eyes, as he wrung Campbell's hand.
"Mind one thing! If that Vavasour shows his teeth, there is a spell will turn him to stone. Use it!"
"Heaven forbid! Let him show his teeth. It is I who am in the wrong. Why should I make him more my enemy than he is?"
"Be it so. Only, if the worst comes to the worst, call him not Elsley
Vavasour, but plain John Briggs—and see what follows."
Valencia entered.
"The post has come in! Oh, dear Major Campbell, is there a letter?"
He put the note into her hand in silence. She read it, and darted back to Lucia's room.
"Thank God that she did not see that I was going! One more pang on earth spared!" said Campbell to himself.
Valencia hurried to Lucia's door. She was holding it ajar and looking out with pale face, and wild hungry eyes.—"A letter? Don't be silent or I shall go mad! Tell me the worst! Is he alive?"
"Yes."
She gasped, and staggered against the door-post.
"Where? Why does he not come back to me?" asked she, in a confused, abstracted way.
It was best to tell the truth, and have it over.
"He has gone to London, Lucia. He will think over it all there, and be sorry for it, and then all will be well again."
But Lucia did not hear the end of that sentence. Murmuring to herself,
"To London! To London!" she hurried back into the room.
"Clara! Clara! have the children had their breakfast?"
"Yes, ma'am!" says Clara, appearing from the inner room.
"Then help me to pack up, quick! Your master is gone to London on business; and we are to follow him immediately."
And she began bustling about the room.
"My dearest Lucia, you are not fit to travel now!"
"I shall die if I stay here; die if I do nothing! I must find him!" whispered she. "Don't speak loud, or Clara will hear. I can find him, and nobody can but me! Why don't you help me to pack, Valencia?"
"My dearest! but what will Scoutbush say when he comes home, and finds you gone?"
"What right has he to interfere? I am Elsley's wife, am I not? and may follow my husband if I like:" and she went on desperately collecting, not her own things, but Elsley's.
Valencia watched her with tear-brimming eyes; collecting all his papers, counting over his clothes, murmuring to herself that he would want this and that in London. Her sanity seemed failing her, under the fixed idea that she had only to see him, and set all right with, a word.
"I will go and get you some breakfast," said she at last.
"I want none. I am too busy to eat. Why don't you help me?"
Valencia had not the heart to help, believing, as she did, that Lucia's journey would be as bootless as it would be dangerous to her health.
"I will bring you some breakfast, and you must try; then I will help to pack:" and utterly bewildered she went out; and the thought uppermost in her mind was,—"Oh, that I could find Frank Headley?"
Happy was it for Frank's love, paradoxical as it may seem, that it had conquered just at that moment of terrible distress. Valencia's acceptance of him had been hasty, founded rather on sentiment and admiration than on deep affection; and her feeling might have faltered, waned, died away in self-distrust of its own reality, if giddy amusement, if mere easy happiness, had followed it. But now the fire of affliction was branding in the thought of him upon her softened heart.
Living at the utmost strain of her character, Campbell gone, her brother useless, and Lucia and the children depending utterly on her, there was but one to whom she could look for comfort while she needed it most utterly; and happy for her and for her lover that she could go to him.
"Poor Lucia! thank God that I have some one who will never treat me so! who will lift me up and shield me, instead of crushing me!—dear creature!—Oh that I may find him!" And her heart went out after Frank with a gush of tenderness which she had never felt before.
"Is this, then, love?" she asked herself; and she found time to slip into her own room for a moment and arrange her dishevelled hair, ere she entered the breakfast-room.
Frank was there, luckily alone, pacing nervously up and down. He hurried up to her, caught both her hands in his, and gazed into her wan and haggard face with the intensest tenderness and anxiety.
Valencia's eyes looked into the depths of his, passive and confiding, till they failed before the keenness of his gaze, and swam in glittering mist.
"Ah!" thought she; "sorrow is a light price to pay for the feeling of being so loved by such a man!"
"You are tired,—ill? What a night you must have had! Mellot has told me all."
"Oh, my poor sister!" and wildly she poured out to Frank her wrath against Elsley, her inability to comfort Lucia, and all the misery and confusion of the past night.
"This is a sad dawning for the day of my triumph!" thought Frank, who longed to pour out his ............